Some call Ridley Scott a stylist. This always bothered me; if anything, the "empty stylistic exercises" that made his career (Alien, Blade Runner) have more to offer in terms of substance and psychological tension than in terms of aesthetic qualities. I, for one, find them to be ugly; his style isn't captivating, but distracting, harsh, and glaring. It's only with recent (and vacuous) exercises like Hannibal that Scott has matured as a visual artist.
With Black Hawk Down, his mind-numbing combat picture, Scott has crafted a marvel of both style and substance; in certain respects, this is his most developed film to date. It recounts, with meticulous detail, the 15-hour Battle of Mogadishu, in which a routine mission by American soldiers to capture Somalian officials in 1993 went awry. Two Black Hawk helicopters were shot down into the midst of hostile territory, and hundreds of angry militiamen ambushed the survivors. It was only through the relentless dedication of rescue troops that anyone managed to escape alive. As such, the film is a vindication of the bravery of American servicemen and a bold assertion that Mogadishu was not a disaster but a triumphant failure: simple, gut-instinct heroism and survival are its central themes. Scott drives his message home by focusing intently on battle as a visceral, terrifying reality; for once, his overheated aesthetic is put to good purpose. Because the film feels so fundamentally real--hyperreal, even, due to the impressive camera work and rapid-fire editing--its depiction of heroism under fire is finally genuine and natural, not forced.
Whereas other directors, such as Steven Spielberg, approach combat from the standpoint of a moralist, Scott's interests lie in the visceral and cinematic possibilities of the battle scenario. It is a dangerous line to walk, as stylistic excess could be read as insensitivity (the fact that Jerry Bruckheimer served as producer doesn't help). But his work here is functional and tightly focused; this movie is a workhorse, and it pummels the audience relentlessly and effectively. Scott's intentions are clear from the get go: This is the experience of war. There is no need to wax poetic or meditate on the meaning of existence.
To insist that such ruminations belong in a war film is absurd and an insult to anyone who has experienced combat first-hand. For Scott, war is a tactical and physical exercise, not a philosophical one. As one character puts it, once the bullets start to fly ideology goes right out the window, and Scott follows through on the premise with admirable skill. Rhetoric and existential soliloquies are cut to a minimum. In this respect, I would say that Black Hawk Down is one of the most genuine and honest depictions of combat ever put to screen.
The problem with many bad war movies, such as Saving Private Ryan, is that the director's narrative and moral purpose hang over the proceedings like a shroud; for all of Spielberg's attempts to depict combat as irrational and out of control, the randomness is far too structured and predictable. He tries to squeeze something that is chaotic and often meaningless into the grip of a patriotic moral fable, and the whole enterprise loses its focus. Black Hawk Down insists that the reality of combat is sufficient in its own right. It's a prescient notion: Now that Americans are serious about these matters, post-Sept. 11, dropping narrative delicacies in favor of nearñjournalistic truth is refreshing and appropriate. Whether this film constitutes art is a good question, but it is most certainly great cinema.